    [Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 40, Number 7 (Monday, February 16, 2004)]
    [Pages 221-227]
    [Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

    <R04>
    Remarks in a Discussion on Education and the Jobs for the
    21st Century Initiative in
    Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

    February 12, 2004

        The President. Thank you all very much. It is nice to be back in
    Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Thank you for such a warm welcome. Behave
    yourself. [Laughter] I--we're going to have an interesting dialog today
    about how our economy works, how we can make sure people are prepared to
    take advantage of a growing economy. I hope that the students here at
    this very fine high school are able to have a better understanding about
    their future and how to seize opportunities.
        Before we begin the discussion, I do want to thank the high school
    for welcoming me and quite a large entourage. [Laughter] Rich, thank you
    and your staff. I appreciate the teachers of this fine high school. I
    want to thank you all for teaching. Teaching is such a noble profession.
        I've come to this high school--it's a high school that's willing to
    raise the bar, challenge what I've been calling the soft bigotry of low
    expectations, that is willing to measure, willing to change if you need
    to change, willing to use curriculum that actually works, in order to
    make sure every child is educated, every child has a chance to succeed.
    This is a fabulous high school. I'm proud of the administrators and
    teachers and students who make it such.
        I also want to thank the parents who are here for paying attention
    to your sons and daughters, for caring about the quality of the
    education they receive. I often talk about the need for us to usher in a
    period of personal responsibility. Nothing is more responsible than a
    parent understanding that he or she is the first teacher of a child, and
    he or she must pay attention to the education of their children.
        I also want to thank our panelists, who we'll talk to in a minute
    here. But I also want to thank members of the mighty Pennsylvania
    congressional delegation for traveling with me today.
        The senior Senator--I try to downplay the senior part--[laughter]--
    today is actually his birthday. That would be Arlen Specter, who is
    traveling with us. I look forward to working with him. Where is the
    Senator? He's somewhere around here anyway. Either that, or he knew this
    was going to be a long speech. [Laughter] We're working well together.
    We've got some challenges in Washington. I appreciate him working with
    my administration on issues such as judges.
        Speaking about friends and people who I think is doing a great job
    for the State of Pennsylvania, Senator Rick Santorum is with us as well.
    [Applause] Don't go overboard. [Laughter] I've got to fly back with him
    to Washington. [Laughter]
        I appreciate the Congressman from this district, Tim Holden.
    Congressman, thank you for accompanying us today. The Congressman kindly
    allowed others from the Pennsylvania congressional district to come into
    his district today, Members such as John Peterson, Joe Pitts, Don
    Sherwood, Todd Platts, Bill Shuster, and Jim Gerlach. Thank you all for
    coming.
        We've got senators here; we've got State representatives here; we've
    got mayors here. Thank you all for being here--city councilmen, a lot of
    citizens.
        I'm proud to be here to share with you some thoughts about how to
    make sure the American Dream shines brightly in every corner of the
    country. Before we have a little discussion about economics and of what
    we can do to make sure people are prepared for

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    the new jobs of the 21st century, I do want to herald a Lauren Simkulak.
    Lauren is a senior at this high school. She came out to meet me at Air
    Force One. She was invited to do so because, you see, she is
    volunteering her time. She's taking time out of her busy life. If you're
    a senior in high school, your life can be very busy, sometimes with
    studying, sometimes with other things, but nevertheless--[laughter].
    She's involved with the Four Diamonds Fund, a fund to create awareness
    for cancer. She is a volunteer in the army of compassion.
        The reason I bring that up is that oftentimes, you hear our
    country's strength is defined as our military might. We're going to stay
    strong. You hear people talk about the might of America being the size
    of our wallets. We want more citizens having bigger wallets. But the
    truth of the matter is, the strength of this country is the heart and
    souls of the American people, people who are willing to love a neighbor
    just like they'd like to be loved themselves.
        Here's my message to the high school students who are listening, and
    to anybody else: Find somebody who hurts and surround them with love.
    Governments--you can do so in all kinds of ways. You can do so in the
    Boys or Girl Scouts. You can do so in the Boys or Girls Club. You can do
    so through your church or your synagogue or mosque. The strength of
    America is the fact that we're a loving, compassionate, decent people
    who are willing to help save America, one soul at a time. I appreciate
    the service of people in this--[applause].
        I want the students here to understand we've been through historic
    times in this country. You hear me often say, I'm optimistic about the
    future. Well, one reason I'm optimistic is because I've seen what we
    have just been through as a nation. Remember, this country has been
    through a recession, an attack by an enemy which clearly hates what we
    stand for. We had some corporate scandals, and by the way, we expect our
    citizens in positions of responsibility to tell the truth. We passed
    tough laws, by the way, to send those corporate criminals to justice,
    which is exactly where they belong because they betrayed the trust to
    employees and shareholders. And then I made the tough decision about
    dealing with threats by committing some incredibly brave citizens into
    harm's way to remove a danger, to remember the lessons of September the
    11th and remove a danger before it became imminent and before it could
    conceivably strike America again. All that affected our economy.
        Think about what this economy has been through, recession, an
    attack, a national emergency, corporate scandals, and war. And yet, the
    economy is growing. The numbers are good, see. The numbers are good, but
    I don't worry about numbers. I worry about people. There are still some
    people looking for work because of the recession. There are people
    looking for work because jobs have gone overseas, and we need to act in
    this country. We need to act to make sure there are more jobs at home,
    and people are more likely to retain a job.
        I've got some ideas that I'd like to share with you, before we get
    to making sure we educate people for the jobs that are being generated
    in the 21st century. The first idea is to make sure there's certainty in
    the Tax Code. As you know, we acted by cutting taxes. We saw all the
    challenges to our economy. We cut taxes, which basically meant people
    had more money in their pocket.
        It's kind of a simple Crawford, Texas, economic lesson. When you
    have more money in your pocket, you're likely to demand a good or a
    service--an additional good or a service. And when you make a demand for
    an additional good or a service, in our economy, somebody will produce
    the good or a service. And when somebody produces the good or a service,
    somebody is more likely to retain a job or find a job. In other words,
    the tax cuts stimulated growth.
        The tax cuts also made it more likely that the small-business sector
    of our country would be strong and vibrant. Seventy percent of the new
    jobs in America are created by small businesses. And that's why much of
    the tax cuts, the individual tax cuts as well as the encouraging of
    investment--those tax cuts which encourage investment, were aimed at
    small businesses.
        The tax cuts are making a difference, but unfortunately, they are
    set to expire, which means if Congress doesn't renew the tax cuts, the
    child credit will go down. So, in other

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    words, if you're now getting a bigger child credit because you're a mom
    or a dad, you're going to pay more taxes. It's a tax increase. The
    marriage penalty will go up if Congress doesn't act. In other words,
    they'll be raising your taxes. In order to make sure people can find
    work or retain a job, we need to make the tax cuts permanent. There
    needs to be certainty in the Tax Code. People need to be able to plan.
    Small businesses need to be able to plan. Individuals need to be able to
    plan. We do not need a tax increase right now in our country.
        Health care costs are too high. It's going to be hard to increase
    jobs with health care costs going up. I put out a plan to address health
    care costs, associated health plans, health savings accounts. But one of
    the interesting components of making sure we control the rising costs of
    health care is to make sure our judicial system doesn't run docs out of
    business and run the cost of medicine up for patients. We need medical
    liability reform in the United States.
        We've got too many lawsuits in America. It's one thing to be taking
    a lawsuit based upon a real claim. There's too many junk lawsuits which
    are running up the cost of doing business. It makes it hard to increase
    the job base. It makes it hard for people to retain a job when people
    are getting sued right and left. We need tort reform at the Federal
    level. We need class-action reform. We need asbestos reform. We need to
    get less regulations on people who are trying to create jobs. Washington
    oftentimes poses too many mandates, which makes it hard to retain a job.
        The other day I met with an entrepreneur from Philadelphia. She runs
    a small foundry. She said, ``I've got some issues. I'm worried about
    jobs.'' She said, ``I'm worried about the taxes jumping up and down.''
    She said, ``A lot of my customers are getting sued, which makes it hard
    for them to buy products from me.''
        She also said something very interesting; she said she's worried
    about reliable energy supplies. You see, when you have blackouts or
    brownouts, and you're trying to employ people, it's awful hard to have--
    to do so. In order to get jobs back, in order for people to retain jobs,
    we need an energy plan in this country. We need to modernize the
    electricity grid. We need to become less reliant on foreign sources of
    energy.
        Listen, Pennsylvanians are great entrepreneurs and farmers. We ought
    to be opening up markets for Pennsylvania products. In other words,
    there's a lot of things we can do. But I'm confident about the future of
    this economy because I've seen what we've been through. I know the
    spirit of America. I know the entrepreneurial spirit. I know the fact
    we've got the best workers in the world. Productivity increases are
    high. This is a fabulous country. There's nothing we can't overcome, and
    we are overcoming it. And as we overcome the recession and war and
    emergency, we better make sure we've got a workforce that is prepared
    for the higher-paying jobs of the 21st century. And that's what we're
    here to talk about today.
        A good education system begins at the early grades. We passed what's
    called the No Child Left Behind Act. It basically says we trust local
    people to chart the path to excellence. We're going to spend more
    Federal money, but we want to know whether or not the children are
    learning to read, write, and add and subtract. This business about just
    shuffling kids through the system has got to end. It's got to end.
        We've got to make sure that as we focus on primary and secondary
    education, we never forget the fact that we can strive for higher
    standards at the high school level. One of the things you hear people
    talking about is reading programs to make sure that those kids who have
    been shuffled through now have a chance to learn to read before it's too
    late and, by the way, using curriculum that actually works, not
    curriculum that sounds good, not curriculum that may be based upon some
    interesting theory, but curriculum that actually makes a difference, so
    that when we measure, we can see clearly that children are learning to
    read.
        We need to expand AP courses. We're going to talk a little bit about
    AP. One of the interesting things about AP courses, it says clearly that
    we expect the best from our children. AP courses challenge our kids. It
    also means that they're more likely to go to college and strive for
    higher goals. Too many of our minority students aren't getting AP
    classes. I've got a plan to make sure AP is

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    spread throughout all segments of our society.
        We've got to make sure that math and sciences are--we've got to
    focus on math and science. We've got to encourage people who have got
    expertise in math and science to come into classrooms. Oftentimes you'll
    hear school districts say, ``We're pinched for teachers. We need extra
    help with math and science.'' We've got a program to encourage people to
    come in and teach part-time to help out. In other words, we're focused
    on making sure that secondary and elementary education works well and
    that high schools work well.
        And another interesting part of our society which oftentimes gets
    overlooked is the fabulous community college system in America. You've
    got a great community college here in--[applause]. Community colleges
    are available and affordable. They're particularly affordable because
    the Federal Government wants to help people go to community college with
    all kinds of different scholarship programs, including Pell grants,
    which we intend to expand, particularly for those students who are
    willing to take rigorous academic programs, are willing to set their
    sights.
        The community college system is flexible, and you're going to hear
    an interesting and innovative program that deals with your health care
    system here in Harrisburg and central Pennsylvania and the community
    college and the high school, to prepare folks for the jobs which
    actually exist.
        Listen, it used to be in job training that they never asked the
    question whether jobs--do the jobs exist for the training programs. The
    way I used to put it is, you used to train 500 hairdressers for 10 jobs.
    And yet we satisfied our requirement at the State level, because they
    didn't ask whether or not the jobs actually existed. They just asked,
    were you training somebody. Now we're beginning to ask the question,
    when you train somebody, is there a job, and does the curriculum make
    sense for the job.
        So what you're about to hear is, educational excellence here in
    Harrisburg exists; innovative programs exist. People who are listening
    in different communities around Pennsylvania and the country might want
    to pay attention to what is happening in this community.
        Rich--I appreciate your hospitality--is the principal of the mighty
    Rams.
        Richard Mazzatesta. You're more than welcome here, Mr. President.
        The President. I guess I should have said, you're the head Ram.
    [Laughter]
        Mr. Mazzatesta. Well, Dr. Hasson might think that I'm the second
    head Ram. [Laughter]
        The President. You can call her a Ram. I'm not. [Laughter] I'm going
    to call her, ``Ma'am.'' [Laughter]
        Barbara Hasson. Barbara.
        The President. Barbara, that's right.

    [Richard Mazzatesta, principal, Central Dauphin High School, made brief
    remarks.]

        The President. Well, I'm here to help. [Laughter] However,
    educational excellence will only be found at the local level. And by
    that I mean, is that it's important to have local control of schools so
    that good superintendents and good principals are able to be--adjust
    according to the circumstances. The Federal Government can write checks,
    and we are. Federal funding is up. What's changed is we're finally
    asking the question, ``Are we getting any results for our money?'' Good
    schools don't mind answering that question.
        Rich said something interesting about the No Child Left Behind Act.
    What's interesting in this piece of legislation is that because of
    measuring, you're able to determine whether or not a child can read or
    write and add and subtract early. And what the measurement system allows
    you to do is, one, analyze curriculum. You know, is it working? Is the
    reading program we've got working? But also, it enables you to focus
    attention on a particular child that might slip behind, which will make
    it easier, by the way, when this law is fully implemented, for high
    schools because you'll have a more literate population coming your way
    at some point in time.
        We've got kind of a gap in the pipeline. There's been a--because we
    haven't focused that intensely on measurement, there's some kids who are
    just being shuffled through, and you're having to remediate. But we're
    going to correct that by having high standards early,

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    enough money to help--provide remedial help so that no child is left
    behind. That's why we called it that law. We don't want anybody left
    behind in America.
        Barbara--listen, I've been listening to Barbaras all my life.
    [Laughter]
        Dr. Hasson. And as I told the President backstage here, he's going
    to listen to one more Barbara. [Laughter]

    [Dr. Hasson, superintendent, Central Dauphin School District, made brief
    remarks.]

        The President. Let me see here--[laughter]--I think we're doing our
    responsibility here at the Federal level. Most funding should be at the
    State and local level, in order to make sure you've got local control of
    the schools. We've increased the Federal funding at the--for elementary
    and secondary school programs up by 49 percent over the last 4 years.
        I think--let me say a couple of things Barbara said. First, because
    you measure, you know whether or not children are learning. I hear
    people say, ``Well, I can't believe you're making people measure.''
    Look, I didn't like to take tests either, but that's too bad. You see,
    we've got to know. If you don't know whether a child can read and write
    and add and subtract, it's likely that child will be just shuffled
    through. And guess who gets hurt? Guess who gets hurt? A lot of inner-
    city kids get hurt. We want the American Dream to be everywhere.
        A lot of kids whose parents may not speak English as a first
    language, they're easy to quit on. Let's just move them through, see.
    But we're through with those days in America. Every child has worth. I
    believe every child can learn, and our systems must challenge mediocrity
    when we find it, must be willing to raise the bar.
        Barbara, that's why I'm here. You're willing to raise the bar. She
    said, ``We accept the challenge.'' It's not my challenge. It's a
    national challenge to make sure every single child can learn. If you
    can't read, there is no way you're going to be able to take advantage of
    the fantastic opportunities being created in America. If you can't read,
    you're going to be left behind when it comes to these unbelievable job
    opportunities that are going to exist.
        And so what we're talking about really here is the basics of job
    training, aren't we? And that's to give the people the skills necessary
    to take advantage of a changing, dynamic, exciting economy.
        Schools can't survive without good teachers, and we've got one with
    us right here. Rebecca is a--shall I tell them 31-year teacher? No, I
    won't say that. [Laughter] It might give away our age. [Laughter] She's
    been in the classroom for 31 years. She is an incredibly dedicated
    professional who told me that after 31 years, she still loves walking
    into the classroom. Rebecca is in charge of the English AP. Would you
    share with us your story?

    [Rebecca Deitman, teacher, Central Dauphin High School, made brief
    remarks.]

        The President. I appreciate your dedication. You're leading with
    your heart, and you've got to be. See, the issue with AP is whether or
    not teachers know how to teach AP. That's one of the bottlenecks, to
    make sure more advanced placement--AP means raising the bar, is what it
    means. It means challenging students to the max, which is what we want
    to do in society, don't we? And part of the money that we're going to
    spend out of Washington is to make sure that there is teacher training
    money.
        Another bottleneck is--you know, a kid goes home and says, ``Mom, I
    want to take the AP exam. How much does it cost?'' And it's quite
    costly. And so, therefore, a lot of students say, ``Well, I'm not going
    to take the course, because it's too much money to take the exam.''
    We've got to help, particularly, low-income students pay for the exam.
    We cannot allow the cost of a test to prevent students from reaching
    high. And so part of the AP program--[applause].

    [Ms. Deitman made further remarks.]

        The President. What Barbara mentioned, for example, is not only
    training AP teachers how to teach AP, which is essential, but if you
    remember, Barbara said, ``We're making sure our teachers have been
    retrained in the curriculum we're now going to use for reading at the
    primary level.'' Teacher training is an essential aspect of making sure
    our children get the best education possible.

    [[Page 226]]

        And one of the reasons you measure, by the way, is to test whether
    or not the curriculum is working. And if the curriculum is not working,
    you need superintendents and principals and teachers bold enough to say
    it's not working. And so then you pick what you think will work, and
    then you've got to train teachers to teach that curriculum. That's what
    the No Child Left Behind Act also does.
        And you've got a vibrant school district here. You see, if you
    listen carefully, what people are saying is, ``We're going to challenge
    every child.'' And that's the beginnings of educational excellence. And
    we need to challenge every child because the jobs of the 21st century
    are going to require a lot of smarts. People have to have the capacity
    to think. It used to be, you know, crank somebody out of high school,
    and if they could run a backhoe, that's going to be fine. And there's
    nothing wrong with backhoe drivers. We're going to need them. But we're
    also going to need computer programmers or people working in the health
    sciences.
        There's some exciting new fields coming, and therefore, the
    education system must start early, make sure the high schools continue
    to raise the bar, and our community colleges must be flexible enough to
    have a curriculum that actually meets the needs of the local
    communities. In other words, you don't need to be training people for
    jobs that don't exist.
        And somebody who understands that is Edna. She runs the Harrisburg
    Area Community College, which as I understand it, is the oldest
    community college----
        Edna Baehre. That's correct.
        The President. The youngest leader with the oldest college.
        Dr. Baehre. Don't I wish. [Laughter]
        The President. Tell us about your school. Tell us how you've made
    the curriculum relevant. Tell us what you're doing.

    [Dr. Baehre, president, Harrisburg Area Community College, made brief
    remarks.]

        The President. Now, what--let's see if I can say--kind of summarize
    what you just said. There's a lot of interesting job opportunities,
    whether it be forklift drivers or health care providers, and there are
    people who need to get extra training to be able to do those jobs. And
    you're helping them. And that's good. That's what we want our community
    colleges to do.

    [Dr. Baehre made further remarks.]

        The President. All right, Roger. Roger is the CEO of PinnacleHealth
    System. He's here because you're looking for people to work. One of the
    most exciting fields is the health care field--one of the exciting
    fields to find work. But you've got to able to have some--got a skill
    set that makes you employable.
        And tell us what you've done with the community college. Tell us
    what kind of people you're looking for.

    [Dr. Roger Longenderfer, president and CEO, PinnacleHealth System, made
    brief remarks.]

        The President. Thank you, Roger. Thanks for being innovative.
        The message I heard from Roger is if you're looking for work in
    central Pennsylvania and you're willing to retrain, willing to go back
    to school, you can find work, see. There's jobs in this part of the
    world that may require a different skill set than you have, but there is
    ample opportunity to retrain, particularly at the community college
    level. And I'm sure there's some people listening out there saying, ``I
    want to work. I'm worried about my job security, but I may be too old to
    go back to the community college.'' That's not the way it works. The
    community college accepts all comers. What Roger is looking for is
    smart, capable, hard-working people who need just a little extra
    training so that he can put them to work.
        Speaking about young workers, Athan's mother is here. Athan is 4?
        Cari Aftosmes. Four-and-a-half.
        The President. Four-and-a-half, yes. I want to make sure she's 4\1/
    2\. Cari is a student at HACC. She's got an interesting story that I
    would like for her to share with you. By the way, for the Congress to
    understand, she got a $1,000 child credit for Athan, and if they don't
    make the tax cuts permanent, she's going to be paying taxes next year.

    [Ms. Aftosmes made brief remarks.]

    [[Page 227]]

        The President. It's a fabulous story. Cari, first of all,
    understands her most important responsibility is to love her child with
    all her heart and, therefore, to be able to provide for her child. She's
    also willing to say, ``I can do better. I want to do better. I want to
    serve my community, and I understand it's going to take a little extra
    time to get the skills necessary.'' So she actually became
    entrepreneurial. She said, ``How best to improve?'' And she researched
    and she found a good company willing to pay for her tuition, a community
    college system that was able to develop a curriculum that matched her
    desires. And here she is on the cusp of a new career, one that pays
    better, with better benefits.
        See, education enables our workers to be more productive. When you
    hear about productivity increases, what you're really hearing about is
    better-paying jobs. But it requires a certain spirit, doesn't it? It
    requires somebody to seize the moment, some citizen to say, ``I want to
    do better.'' Government can't make you do better. We can provide the
    opportunities, and we all work hard to do so. But it requires the spirit
    of a person like Cari to rise up and say, ``I want to do my duty as a
    mom. I'm going to do my duty as a wife. I'm going to do my duty as a
    citizen to provide care and comfort for people in hospitals.'' She took
    advantage of the opportunity. For those of you looking for work out
    there, take advantage of the opportunities available to embetter
    yourself.
        Listen, I'm going to tell you something. We've been through a lot in
    this country. We're going to win the war on terror. We're going to
    promote freedom and peace. The world is going to be more free and,
    therefore, more peaceful. At home, we're going to be a society which
    understands the issues facing our fellow citizens, helps our fellow
    citizens realize great expectations of our society, encourages the
    entrepreneurial spirit of Americans, enables people to realize their
    dreams by having an education system which works and functions well.
        And as well this is a society where people who hurt and are lonely
    and hopeless can find solace, because there's a loving citizen with arms
    open, willing to do their duty as an American by loving their neighbor.
        I am so honored to be back here in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. I thank
    you for the warm welcome. I thank our panelists for this discussion. And
    may God bless you all.

    Note: The President spoke at 11:06 a.m. at Central Dauphin High School.